Vault Door Buying Tips

A vault door is a large secure door used to create custom built vaults large enough to allow walk in access.

Pros - A solid vault provides the highest level of burglary and fire protection.
Can be concealed relatively easily.
Roomy enough to store just about anything.
Custom vault interiors can be made to accommodate a wide range of items.

Cons - Constructing a vault is a major undertaking, ideally built at the same time a home is being constructed.
The cost of building a vault can be quite high.

Vault Door Specific Buying Tips:

Install in an accessible location - All too often vaults go unused when they are located too far away to be conveniently accessed. Many times a new vault owner will over think the planned location for their vault, locating it in some cleverly concealed location or disguising the vault behind false doors or walls. While concealing your vault is fine, don’t do this at the cost of overall convenience or the vault will likely fall out of use over time. It’s far better to be storing your commonly used valuables in a not so hidden vault than to have these items left out for easy pilfering. Rather than outthinking the burglar along with yourself, rely on the vault to perform its job of protection and place it in a location it’s likely to get the most use. If your home is burglarized, a well built burglary vault will faithfully protect your contents.

Consider an additional small safe for quick daily access - It can sometimes be difficult to install vaults in locations that are conveniently accessible. Many homeowners in this situation find that owning a vault and a small safe allows for convenient access to their daily use items while still having ample space for the important items used less often.
By locating a small to mid size Jewelry Safe in the bedroom or closet, commonly used items remain conveniently accessible and protected.

Check for a thick solid steel door: It is essential that the vault door you purchase has a a continuous solid steel plate of substantial thickness. Without this base level of steel protection, any vault door can be opened within minutes despite the hoopla of additional advertised protection features. The majority of vault doors on the market tout a plethora of protection features, but virtually all fail miserably in this essential area.
The vault you choose must have at minimum a ½” thick solid steel door.
Steel is very expensive and heavy, vastly increasing the doors build cost and the cost of shipping overseas to the reseller. As a result, nearly all oversea manufactured vault doors (and even many local built vault doors) cut these costs by constructing their doors with thin sheet metal wrapped around various forms of drywall to give the appearance of a robust door. Click here to see an example of this flimsy construction in a luxury safe door.
Be highly suspect if the vault manufacturer or reseller doesn’t state solid steel or lists "composite" for their door material as this can be anything from sheet metal wrapped around wood to sheet metal and drywall.
Also be on the lookout for vault sellers that list just ‘door thickness’ rather than the barrier material type and thickness as this is a recent trick many underhanded vault marketers employ. By listing the total thickness of the vault door including the dial, barrier material, airspace, inner bolt work, etc.... the provided figure can sound quite impressive while actually preventing the buyer from obtaining any solid information on how thick the barrier material actually is or what it's made of.Click here to learn more about the industry recognized protection rating systems.
For details on the protection levels offered by Brown Safe... click here.

Judge a vault door by its weight - Weight is one of the biggest factors when determining the base ability of a vault door to protect from both burglary and fire.

Steel is heavy, a quality vault door with solid steel walls will weigh substantially more than a flimsy door fabricated by wrapping sheet metal around insulation panels.

High density concrete based amalgamate is heavy. A concrete amalgamate based composite fire vault door will weigh substantially more than a door that uses insulation panels.

Steel and high density concrete amalgamate together are really heavy. A true burglary vault door with solid steel walls and concrete amalgamate fire cladding often carries three time the mass of an equivalent size door constructed from sheet metal and drywall panels. These are the vault doors to look for.

If a vault door is heavy, it doesn't necessarily mean the door carries a lot of solid steel, the weight can come from the concrete amalgamate alone. To determine the amount of solid steel used by a door, it's best to learn the actual steel thickness.

Stick with a UL approved lock - Always check that the vault door you plan to purchase has a UL approved Group 2 lock or better. The three dependable lock manufacturers are LaGard, Sargent & Greenleaf, and Kaba Mas. These are the only lock manufacturers that produce locks guaranteed to provide decades of trouble free operation.
If you decide on a door without a UL approval, there's a 95% chance the lock comes from China. A large majority of vault manufacturers who equip their vaults with "their own" lock brand also use Chinese locks. While highly affordable, Chinese built locks are highly undependable and are prone to early failure.
We routinely receive calls from agonizing safe owners permanently locked out by a malfunctioning Chinese lock. Opening a vault door with a faulty lock is generally a very costly and time consuming ordeal as itcan be difficult to impossible to obtain accurate blueprints to aid in a clean repairable entry into the vault. Most vault owners in this unfortunate position opt for the faster and less expensive forced entry option. The vault door is rendered unusable after a forced entry and the owner is stuck with a hefty bill and in the market for a new reliable and secure door... many current clients sought out our company after experiencing one or more highly unpleasant lockouts with inferior vault door locks.
To view details on our UL approved electronic keypad lock, click here.Click here to view info on our combination dial lock.
To view our biometric lock... click here.

Avoid fireboard or drywall based fire vault doors: Although fire vault doors constructed with fireboard, drywall, fiberboard, or other panel based insulation materials make up the majority of doors sold today, they provide inferior fire protection when compared to true composite fire vault door or composite clad fire vault doors.
More importantly, insulation panel based vaults often provide little to no burglary protection.

Consider entry convenience: A vault that is slow to open or access is a vault you are less likely to use. Adding an electronic lock can make opening the vault door quick and easy, as well as enabling the user to reset the combination when needed without the aid of a locksmith or combination kit. For the ultimate in user convenience and security, a high grade biometric lock can't be beat. Click here to see our electronic lock offering.
To view our biometric lock... click here.

Check for re-lockers: All quality vault doors should have re-lockers to help ensure the vault remains locked in the case of a burglary. Re-lockers are hardened pins that are triggered, in a variety of ways during an attack, and cannot be retracted without hours of drilling. The number of re-lockers on a vault door will range from 2-10+ depending on the size and burglary grade of the door.
Bear in mind, re-locker pins only prove useful when the vault door has a substantially thick steel.
Most vault doors today are equipped with two or more re-locker pins. But on a steel deficient vault, these pins along with the locking bolts simply tear or bend right through the vault's thin door jamb with minimal prying.
All Brown Safe vault doors feature a robust time prooven glass plate re-locker system.

Consider a custom vault: Does the size of your chosen vault door make best use of the space it's occupying? Brown Safe is one the only vault manufactures in the world to offer fully customizable vault doors. Custom sizes, and finishes are available at a very reasonable price point. We can work with you and/or your interior designer, architect, and contractor to ensure a quality vault built to your exact specifications.
To see a few example custom vaults...click here.

Common Construction Types:

Poured in place: Manufactured by building concrete forms inside and out, then pouring concrete. High PSI concrete is recommended for added security.

Modular concrete panels: Pre-fabricated concrete panels utilizing high strength concrete are purchased and shipped to the jobsite where they are then assembled into a 5 or 6 sided room. Panels are typically 8’H x 2-4’W

Tips on Building and Installing a Vault:

Vault rooms constructed with concrete block should have rebar placed in every cell vertically and horizontally and poured solid with concrete.

Vault rooms made by poured in place construction should have 1-2 curtains of rebar on staggered 8” centers. This will provide a vault with no hole or opening larger than 4”.

Concrete: (for poured in place vault rooms)

High strength concrete, with a minimum of 3000-6000 PSI, is recommended.
Ideally concrete should be 5000-6000 PSI for added strength.

When using high PSI concrete, include a material such as Stealth Fibermesh® which forms minute channels for vaporizing moisture to escape. This prevents the concrete from fracturing or even exploding when over heated.

Steel chaff can be added for increased burglary protection, but will decrease the overall fire protection of the vault.

Floor and ceiling:

The construction and thickness of the vault's floor and ceiliing should be equal to that of the vault walls.

Ventilation:

Ducting should be rebar obstructed and of a narrow rectangular shape.

Door opening:

When constructing the vault room it is important to keep the door opening as square and true as possible for easier vault door installation.

Accessories:

Emergency lighting and ventilation are recommended for all vault rooms.